


ShinRa's Sword

by Lassarina



Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Gen, Remix
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-24
Updated: 2011-03-24
Packaged: 2017-10-17 05:58:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/173651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lassarina/pseuds/Lassarina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>ShinRa has defeated their warriors and taken their town, but they will not take what it means to be Wutain.  She will see to that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	ShinRa's Sword

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mystiri1](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mystiri1/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Worth Fighting For](https://archiveofourown.org/works/130586) by [mystiri1](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mystiri1/pseuds/mystiri1). 



Shizuko hears the rapid patter of footsteps behind her, and knows what the child has come to say. Did she not stand in her doorway this morning, watching the young men pray to the ancestors for victory in battle before they took up their hoes and scythes for the day's work? Did she not feel the icy chill of the autumn breeze this morning, creeping beneath her clothing like searching fingers and carrying the clatter of the funereal drums with it? She does not permit herself to bow her head in sorrow, not yet. Instead, she takes a firm grip on the weed that has taken root here, and carefully pulls it out of the soft, damp soil. She lays it aside in her basket and surveys her garden.

"Lady Shizuko," the runner gasps. Shizuko recognizes Mei's voice before she stands, slowly, her knees protesting the movement in the chilly air.

"Yes?" Right now she is not Mei's great-aunt, but the elder of the village.

Mei's face is smudged with dirt and tears. "The ShinRa have won," she says bitterly. "They say they're coming here, to stay."

Shizuko nods. "Please tell your mother that I invite the general and three officers of his choosing to tea," she says formally.

Mei's mouth drops open. "Great-aunt—I mean—Lady Shizuko, _why?_ They've killed so many—Ling's father—they're taking your _house—_ " She is too angry to speak well, and rightly so.

"We will treat them with respect," Shizuko says, "and show them the traditions of our land. Perhaps that will engender in them some respect as well." She has little hope of that, as ShinRa shows no respect for anything but money, and Three Willows is not a wealthy village. Still, there is no cause for her to lower herself to their level.

Mei considers rebellion, but at ten, she has not quite reached that age where anything an adult says is cause for bitter argument. She is angry when she runs back to Shizuko's niece with her instructions. It cannot be helped.

Shizuko thinks it is a good thing she went to work in the garden this morning. Now it is properly arranged for the ceremony. She goes inside to see that the house is similarly prepared to receive guests.

~*~

Shizuko's son brings her the tally of the dead, speaking out of the hearing of the ShinRa. It is better than she expected—only twelve of the men under forty are dead, another five too wounded to work, although three may recover. It is worse than she had hoped. She had suggested that they let ShinRa go by, for they are no immovable object to stand in the way of an unstoppable force, but they were determined to fight.

She does not blame them. This is her home; were she twenty years younger, she admits wryly, she might have stood with them and wielded a hoe herself.

Her grandson, Mei's cousin, is among the dead. He rushed at the ShinRa general and was summarily cut down. Her son spares her the details; Shizuko reads them in the set of his body. She will help her daughter-in-law sew the shroud tonight.

There are other things she must do to ensure the safety of Three Willows, and there is no time for sleep. She will rest when the ShinRa are gone. She ensures that the officers have their needs provided for, insofar as she is able, and then she goes to the mourning house. The women of the village sit together, to pray and remember and sew the shrouds. The men grieve in their own way, with drinks and gaming as though nothing has occurred. Her son promises to stay sober and keep anyone from doing something foolish.

Shizuko hems the shroud with patient, even stitches. She is not sure, any longer, if she believes that the spirits of the dead watch over Wutai when properly placated. She has performed the rituals all of her life, and she has never failed to light a stick of incense for her parents or her husband, and yet ShinRa marches over their land as if nothing could ever stop them.

"I hope you poison them tomorrow," her daughter-in-law says suddenly, biting off a knotted thread with a flash of her teeth. Shizuko thinks her daughter-in-law is picturing something much less fragile than a thread being severed.

"Lady Shizuko would not violate the laws of hospitality," another of the women says firmly.

"They have no respect for our ways," Shizuko's daughter-in-law says.

"But we do," Shizuko reminds her. The woman is grieving, and for that, Shizuko does not censure her. "We have our own honor to tend; let them see to theirs."

"They have none," a woman working on another shroud says.

"That is as it may be," Shizuko says. "It is not ours to remedy."

She pretends not to see her daughter-in-law wipe away her tears with her sleeve. Shizuko sews a straight line of patient, even stitches. She will give her grandson the best to take with him. Grief is for the time when work is not necessary.

~*~

Only their general attends her ceremony, excusing his subordinates on the grounds of urgent duties. Shizuko is not surprised; doubtless his thoughts went the same route as her daughter-in-law's. He approaches warily. She welcomes him to the garden and explains the ritual. For this, she does not perform the full, five-hour ceremony with all its intricacies. He would be unfamiliar with the process, and she suspects he would not take well to feeling as though she might laugh at him for his ignorance.

Still, that is no reason to disrespect the ceremony. Shizuko cleans the implements, boils the water, and steeps the tea with the same patience as always. He watches her, curiosity shining behind his Mako-lit eyes. He seems uncomfortable with the measured pace of the ceremony, though too polite to say so initially.

When she pours the tea, he swallows half his cup in the manner of a man accustomed to treating sustenance as simply another chore. Shizuko says nothing of it, and sips her own tea slowly, savoring the bitterness. There is comfort in focusing on a task so often performed that the body can do it of its own accord. Ritual can be its own reward.

"Do you not find this time-consuming?" he asks her abruptly, setting down his teacup with a faint click.

Shizuko pins him with the look that silences the most obstreperous person in the village, and though he does not look abashed, he tips his head to indicate that he respects her for challenging him.

"The time is unimportant," she says. She would not have brought it up herself, but since he has thrown down the gauntlet, she does take the time to explain the ceremony, its meaning and its purpose. He listens thoughtfully, focused on absorbing what she says. It is not out of respect for their traditions, she knows this, but it is a _kind_ of respect.

She could almost pity him for being so like the blade he carries: efficient, bright, and suited admirably to his task, but clumsy for other uses. Some blades can turn a furrow in a field as easily as they carve up an opponent, but not him, nor his narrow and glittering sword. Weapons of war do not require pity, nor do they offer any. Shizuko wonders if the general measures her and finds her wanting, as she does him.

She finishes the ceremony and bows him out of the garden. He does not understand them any better, but she has behaved with propriety.

Shizuko sets herself the repetitive, soothing task of cleaning the implements and putting them away. Soon, ShinRa's sword will be gone, and she can work to rebuild Three Willows. She will grieve for her grandson, and light incense in his name.

For now, she tends the garden.


End file.
